Wednesday 14 November 2012

Day 75 - 80. Patagonia blows a welcome kiss, and are we in Northern Europe?


Day 75 Las Lajas. Patagonia shows what it's famous for by blowing a welcome kiss.


161km with 1265 of climbing. Just numbers.

The day started with being woken at perhaps 4:30am by the sound of the wind. Quite soothing to fall back to sleep with.

When we left camp, the first hint that this day was going to be different was when we were riding at 45km/h along the flat with very little effort at all. Thanks to a tailwind. At one point I found myself rolling along at 67km/h along a flat section without pedalling. Totally due to the wind. So at a guess, the wind may have been gusting anywhere between 80-90km/h.

There were 2 hills to climb, and during the climb, when the wind gusted, I found I accelerated up from 14km/h up to 24km/h. Doing this speed at the incline of 4% is very unusual for me, I normally wouldn't be able to sustain it for long at all.

Even when there was a tailwind, there was always an element of cross wind. This made the bike want to suddenly turn when the wind gusted, and had us all leaning at what appeared to be an unnatural angle into the wind, only to quickly straighten when the gust settled down.

After lunch, the road turned from south to west. Given the wind was coming from the north west, this meant a headwind and a cross wind. Very early after the turn, there was a bridge that had its railing resonating with the wind. So it was twisting and making this horrible sound, I wouldn't want to be nearby when that piece of metal finally lets go and flies horizontally across the road!

The final 25km/h was very difficult riding into the wind. It was lifting a lot of dirt and sometimes small rocks, so we rode through a dust storm. Those little rocks sting when they hit! I heard of 3 people who fell due to the cross wind. I found myself sometimes having to push hard to even go at 8km/h. The effort required to push through after battling to keep control of the bike all day meant I ran out of energy, and the final few km was very difficult and slow.

When arriving at the campsite, I was told that I should have a look in a mirror before having a shower. I was covered in dust, and had an excellent free dirt treatment on my face, except for where my sunglasses were.

I was very glad we were at a campsite. It was new, and the showers were excellent. In past years, the campsite didn't exist, so the groups made a bushcamp a little out of town. Showering using the usual single water bottle would have been difficult to get all the dirt off!

Day 76 Alumine. A welcome change.


131km with 1516m of climbing. Well, that was the plan. We went a little further to find a campsite that was still open, so it was really 138km.

A chilly start, and thankfully the wind was absent. In 2010, this stage was their windiest day to the point where they could no longer ride and had to hide and hold on to their bikes so that they didn't fly away. So we had packed our tents, had breakfast and left early, and was riding at 7am.

We started riding through the usual pampas, which is like a flat plain with patches of grass and low shrubs. To be honest I was getting far too used to it. We climbed for just over 50km to reach lunch. During the climb and as we entered the mountains, the scenery dramatically changed. We saw forests of unusual trees called Monkey-Puzzle tree that have a very distinctive shape.

Not only that, when we reached the lunch spot, the trees had these white lines on the same side of their trunks. Same with the road signs. The day before's wind had been very strong as well in this region, apparently resulting in the snow falling almost horizontally. The owner of the nearby restaurant said it would have been impossible to ride through the area the day before. Most of us were glad to see the restaurant beside the lunch spot, as we could get decent coffee before continuing on 300m higher to finish 1000m climb to the top. The top by the way had patchy snow. It made a nice change, and very beautiful.

Malcolm near the top of the climb amongst snow, SNOW!
Yes I'm Australian, snow has novelty factor

I had been so surprised that we could get coffee at lunch, I forgot to restock on energy bars. With 50km to go, I once again ran out of energy. I began to dream consistently of having a mars chocolate bar, maybe even 3. So it was a very tough and slow ride to the finish. To remedy this uncomfortable feeling, I found that our campsite was near the centre of town. In the town, there was very good coffee, ice cream and they even made milkshakes. So I had all 3. Life is very good.

A very beautiful day thanks to the forest of a different type of tree, snow, fascinating rock formations, a great view over a lake with snow capped mountains in the background.

Day 77 Junin de los Andes

110km, was supposed to be 120km, but we rode 10km extra the day before getting to an unscheduled campsite. 1144m of climbing.

The ride consisted of following a river downstream. So you would expect the road to go consistently downhill. Well, overall it did, but it snaked up and down a hillside and following the hillside terrain, so it was a lot of up and down. It was quite nice to be amongst the trees for so long.

At one stage I saw a deer on the side of the road just staring at me. Once I passed it, I found the deer happily trotting along behind me. This is when I got that stupid song from the movie "The sound of music" in my head that has the words "A doe, a deer, a female deer...". That song is so annoying, it sticks in the mind so well. It's stuck in your mind now isn't it? Go on, try and forget it. Not working is it? Some people later stopped and found the deer liked to be patted, clearly used to people.

The unpaved surface was good. Still, it almost caught me out on one corner where I went into a corner and my front tyre let go. I managed to straighten up and use a bit more of the road before I fell. Turned out 2 others had a similar situation and fell. Christine later found herself in hospital as a precaution to make sure she was ok. She had soft tissue damage to her shoulder, a common injury for us cyclists (or broken collarbones).

The day was going well until after lunch where I scored a puncture. I went to put the spare tube in, only to find a puncture in that one as well, this was from all the time it had spent rattling around in my saddle bag. Better still, the patches I'd bought back in Peru were low quality, so difficult and messy to apply. The dirt tyres I had on are very tight on the wheel. So after putting in a whole bunch of effort to change the tube twice, do some patching and pump the tyre a few times with a tiny little pump giving my chest and arms an Arnold Schwarzenegger grade workout, I'd lost an hour and a half. Normally a simple change of a tube takes 5 minutes.

Still, the time spent on the side of the road was a welcome relief, as left knee was still reminding me it wasn't happy. Furthermore, my left ankle was also shouting at me quite loudly as well. I must have been keeping my leg at a strange angle trying to nurse my knee, resulting in a strained ankle.

Day 78 Ruta de 7 lagos

I bowed out of riding this day due to my left leg didn't want to come out and play. I figured if I kept going, next to go would be my hip!

So I missed a short 90km day with 987m of climbing.

Still, an enjoyable day. The scenery is still showing trees and yellow flowers and snow capped mountains. The local architecture has become noticeably Northern European, the type with the steep roof and being made of timber. This is both for shops and houses. I would gladly live in the cabin style houses here.

Further along we saw the unspectacular yet somehow still  fascinating stream that splits. One side flows to the Atlantic Ocean, the other side flows to the Pacific Ocean.

On arrival to our campsite however...oh wow. Just stunning. We camped on the side of a lake. Of course surrounded by mountains. There the luxuries of a small shop, showers, toilets, fireplaces and even kayaks for those inclined to go for a paddle. A very beautiful place to stay. I found standing knee deep in the cold lake for a little while brought some relief to both my knee and ankle.

Later that night, I opened my tent and found a clear sky full of stars. Was quite nice to listen to music for a little while and drift back to sleep. It was cool enough in this place not to have mosquitoes at night this time of year.



Day 79 Villa la Angostura

Even though I wasn't limping around so much when walking, I had this day in the truck as well to allow some recovery.

The day starts with the usual pack tents, breakfast, load trucks then begin the ride. Except for those of us in Richard's truck. We started in a more civilised way, by going to the small shop lakeside and enjoying a coffee and a chat before heading off.

The day was short. 61km on unpaved road through forest. Nothing quite as stunning as the previous days, it felt like we could be almost anywhere in the world, but still nice.

On arrival at our campsite, most of us of course soon invaded the town to see what was there. Oh the shops that sell both chocolate and ice cream! I wasn't stuffing around, and got 1/2kg of ice cream, 4 flavours. 2 other guys bought 1/4kg, and talked of how back home a single ice cream cone was enough. Then only an hour later those same people got ANOTHER 1/4kg of ice cream. Nice try guys!

Day 80 San Carlos de Bariloche

Back on the bike for a 86km ride with 746m of climbing.

The first part of the day consisted of riding alongside lakes, protected from any wind by the trees. The 2 days off the bike had clearly been beneficial, and I felt very strong. Yolande commented on how much taller gears I now use with a lower cadence during the climbs. I was happily riding with some of the stronger riders, stop, take a photo, then catch up again. Keeping in mind however that on this day we didn't have timing, so everyone was taking a more relaxed pace.



Lunch was on the side of the lake, and looking across the lake we could see Bariloche. As soon as we left lunch and crested the next hill, there was a headwind. Not the same howling, throw you off the bike type of wind that we had 5 days before, but still enough to slow us down. The good thing was that we soon turned to follow the lake around, so the wind then became a tailwind. So the last 25km into Bariloche was easy and fast, where we could keep up with traffic.

As for Bariloche itself. It feels very Northern European. More timber buildings with a steep roof. There are huge shops entirely dedicated to chocolate. I'd hate to count how many calories are available here. It's a pretty place beside a lake. Here we have a rest day. Will I give in to temptation? Yes. Just a little.

1 comment:

  1. The glorious scenery just keeps on coming! Every view is stunning! Enjoyed your story of the wind factor, but my favourite must be your idolising deer! Where's the photo???? And I thought that you were over icecream???? Right!!!! Another great stage in your incredible journey!

    ReplyDelete